Kilmarnock FC

For my last blog post I thought I would try and give an honest appraisal of what a trip to the 'theatre of pies' entails for the other teams in the league; whilst visiting Kilmarnock is undoubtedly a privilege for any away fans,  there are definitely some flaws that could be ironed out.

For some context, Kilmarnock play their home games at 'Rugby Park', which may be ironic to some, however, the name is based on one of the streets in which the ground is located. The ground is relatively large for the league, holding a maximum of 17,889 and is relatively modern.

In terms of travelling to Rugby Park, the journey from central (by train) is roughly 40 mins and around £7 for a return; so, relatively cheap and accessible compared to many in the league. Potentially the only negative would be the walk, which takes roughly 20 mins, however this can be nicely segmented by the various pubs enroute (The Tartan Sheep being my usual). An aspect I do think is a positive about Rugby Park is the 'Park Hotel' which is literally on the door of the stadium. As the bar is within the hotel, it's a welcoming, non-threatening, place for away fans to fit in as many drinks pre-match as possible. However, I would recommend leaving a decent amount of time to get into the ground as there has been ticketing problems as of late (which the Rangers fans made sure to voice).

Personally, the seating location for away fans within Rugby Park is average mostly due to the away fan numbers that usually come - the away fans are seated in an end stand called the 'Chadwick Stand' which holds roughly 5,000 (this is a guess). For the smaller clubs, they don't bring enough fans to warrant such a size (which is the clubs fault as they could be moved to the main stand) and in-turn often fail to generate any atmosphere. For the two big teams, recently they have been disappointed by the stand purely from the fact that they can fill it twice and ideally would want a higher allocation. However, if away fans do fill the stand, I believe it is a good experience - close to the pitch and no restricted views. 

In terms of the facilities, Rugby park is a treat for away fans for one reason alone - the Killie Pie. The Killie pie is notorious for being arguably the best pie in British football, and at a price of £2.50 you would be daft to not have at least a couple (it won the award two years running). In terms of the other items, Killie rank just below average with a tea setting you back £2 whilst a programme is £3 ( which I think is still a joke).

So overall, I honestly would recommend visiting Rugby park for the pies alone and as a side note, on our current attacking abilities - it's a fairly safe bet that you won't get trounced. 

If you enjoyed this instalment, check out my previous blog here:https://scottishawaydays.blogspot.com/2019/11/celtic-fc.html